Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Pond Scum '2016

Tracks list

Will Oldham has taken on enough different personas over the course of his career
-- recording under several different names, most of them variations on the
Palace rubric, and in every style, from the stark solo performances of Days in
the Wake to the polished "Nashville Sound" arrangements of Sings Greatest Palace
Music -- that he seems to be as much a character actor as a musician. (And he's
worked as a professional actor, making the analogy all the more fitting.) With
this in mind, this collection of Bonnie "Prince" Billy performances recorded for
broadcast on the late John Peel's BBC radio show finds Oldham revisiting a
number of songs from throughout his career, but with a different perspective, as
if he's choosing to re-think his character as he reinterprets his work. The
Bonnie "Prince" Billy on Pond Scum performs in a cooler and more refined manner
than the troubled man on Days in the Wake or There Is No-One What Will Take Care
of You, but the arrangements are spare and whisper-quiet. Though his tenor is
better controlled here, his voice cracks and wanders enough to remind listeners
this persona is kin to the lost souls who dominated Oldham's early work. This
collection can be read as another example of Oldham's stylistic shape-shifting,
yet the relative calm and direct approach of these performances also allows for
a straightforward appreciation of his songwriting. These versions of "Stable
Will," "Jolly One," "Drunk at the Pulpit," and "Trudy Dies" sound emotionally
honest and both beautiful and troubling as Oldham's wordplay, by turns mannered
and spontaneous, cries out over a minimal backdrop of guitar. On Pond Scum,
these songs seem to escape fully formed from Oldham's soul, even the no-frills
cover of Prince's "The Cross," and if one has to take an educated guess about
which Bonnie "Prince" Billy we get on this album, it's certain that what he has
to say is well worth hearing.

Tracklist:
1.01 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - (I Was Drunk at the) Pulpit (6:02)
1.02 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Death to Everyone (4:14)
1.03 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Arise, Therefore (4:04)
1.04 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Jolly Five (64) (4:43)
1.05 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Beezle (2:27)
1.06 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Jolly One (2/15) (3:32)
1.07 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - When Thy Song Flows Through Me (2:21)
1.08 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - The Houseboat (O How I Enjoy The Light) (2:59)
1.09 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Trudy Dies (2:43)
1.10 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - The Cross (2:07)
1.11 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Stable Will (2:47)
1.12 - Bonnie "Prince" Billy - The Idol On The Bar (4:04)

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